Feb 19 2006
By Megan Nicol Reed
Hindsight is a truly terrible thing. With it, I realise I would never have donned leg-warmers and a leotard like she did. With it I realise being compared to Frenchie when I wanted to be Sandy wasn't such a bad thing. And with it I realise that for all my careful research I missed the dirt on Olivia Newton-John.
The night before my interview with the 57-year-old pop crooner, who performs her first solo New Zealand concert this week in Christchurch, the publicist forwarded me an email from Newton-John's PA. "Obviously, Olivia is talking about the tour - can you please be sure they know she is not going to talk about her personal life -thanks!"
Eggshells required then. Although it seems a tad rich coming from a woman whose face has pedalled a million mags. "Olivia: I'm not broke," when Koala Blue, her boutique clothing line, went bust and franchisees complained of bad management. "Brave Olivia fights back!" when she got breast cancer. "Olivia breaks her silence on marriage split," when she divorced Matt Lattanzi, 15 years after she met him on the set of the roller-skating fantasy film Xanadu. And more recently, "Olivia weeps as she tells of life after disappearance of boyfriend," when her partner of nine years Patrick McDermott went missing last June.
The day after our interview the Aussie papers peal with delight: "Boyfriend mystery, but Olivia finds new love."
It doesn't pay to interview your childhood heroes. There's too much ingratiation, a mild desperation to impress with the childhood scrapbook of tribute parties and down-pat repertoire of song lyrics - your subject can almost escape your grasp.
"I'm a pretty private person. I'm happy to talk about things that involve me but if they involve someone else in my life then I won't." Oh c'mon Olivia, let's get personal.
Koala Blue? Resurrected after 12 years, Australian wines are now sold under the brand. "Business projects have to be about things that I care about, but singing is where my heart is."
Cancer? She had a mastectomy 14 years ago and has had regular mammograms since. "I was reading this book the other day and it talked about being a conqueror not a survivor. So that's me, a conqueror."
Lattanzi? They have an amicable relationship. "Our daughter Chloe's well-being has always come first."
McDermott? They have no more information. "Singing has helped me deal with the grief, although it's difficult with no closure."
But she held out on me.
The day after our interview the Aussie papers peal with delight: "Boyfriend mystery, but Olivia finds new love." Eight months after McDermott failed to return from an overnight fishing trip, Newton-John has apparently found sanctuary in the arms of American multimillionaire Michael Klein. Friends and neighbours for 20 years, they've been dating for a month, taking their first vacation together at Donald Trump's Mar a Lago Club and private estate in Florida.
That's not what you told me, Olivia. You said you'd just checked in with 20-year-old Chloe to perform at a private charity function the following day. We even shared a wee joke at the irony of a star who is revered for her good works and environmental concerns staying in such a monument to the guilty pleasures of capitalism. "It's so far from earthy, but it's gorgeous," you said.
Klein looks to be a fleshy man. He wears glasses and his hair recedes from a generous forehead. Having once dated ex-Miss World Marjorie Wallace and 70s supermodel Cheryl Tiegs, dating Olivia seems true to form. But Newton-John's last two long-term relationships have been with much younger men, pretty men with fine features and luscious locks, a faint air of the bad boy to them. An analyst might even surmise that in Lattanzi and McDermott she was looking for a real life Danny Zuko.
The press release promoting her Christchurch concert calls her the "Grease star". Newton-John's graciously worn the mantle of "Rydell High sweetheart" for the past 28 years, but with four Grammys, five number one hits and 15 top 10 singles under her sweatband, it must irk her.
"Not at all. How many people get to be part of something with such enduring appeal? I love that. It amazes me how this movie never dies."
After The Sound Of Music, Grease is the most successful musical film ever made. Newton-John scarcely requires a reminder, but tucked away at the bottom of the wardrobe in her Malibu home are those black pants that clung to her tidy little figure like a second skin. Do they still fit?
"I'm not telling," she laughs. She laughs a lot. Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle.
Those pants symbolised Good Sandy's transformation into Bad Sandy. Three years after Grease she did "Physical", the second longest running number one single in US music history, shocking fans of her prissier country sound with its sweaty, rocky raunchiness.
The media has rapturously documented her charity work. She serenaded Pope John Paul II at the Jubilee Celebration for the Sick and Healthcare Workers. She opened the Olivia Newton-John Cancer Centre in her hometown, Melbourne. She launched the Livkit, a breast self-examination and reminder pack for women, including a CD with her "Not Gonna Give Into It" survivors' anthem.
This daughter of a professor of German literature seems more goody two-shoes than bad girl. True or false?
"I knew you were going to ask that," she twitters in her pretty, soft Australian accent. "Everyone has stuff about them that they don't like or choose not to talk about." Tell me more, tell me more.
"I never thought I would be talking about things like breasts in public. But I was in a fitting room once and a woman told me that she'd beaten breast cancer. It helped me and I thought, `Well, I could use my position to do that for other women'. To say, `Here I am and I'm OK'."
Definitely a goody-goody then. "No way!" interrupts Chloe from the background. They kid around for a moment. Photos of the two are captioned "best friends". Is it for real?
"I'd say we're really very close, but we're also mother and daughter and we have our spats like everyone else," says Newton-John. "Look, she's just brought me a cup of tea," she says, only too aware that this is the sort of mother and daughter scene the media love. English Breakfast with soy milk and honey. "It's perfect, thank-you Chloe. Just the way I like it."
Olivia Newton-John was never cool. But then again hindsight can be a wonderful thing.
Olivia Newton-John performs at the Westpac Centre, Christchurch, Thursday.
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